


as time goes by

by giaucherie



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst with a Happy Ending, Casablanca References, Don't worry ;), Dreams and Nightmares, Multi, Non-Linear Narrative, Psychological Trauma, all relationships will show up, let's all repress our emotions together!!, mash needed another female main character, mentions of how much i hate sigmund freud, overlapping storylines, slow burn-ish? use it lightly
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-17 18:14:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29104644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/giaucherie/pseuds/giaucherie
Summary: BJ sighed in mock disappointment. “I sure wish Hawkeye was here, I bet he’d bet.”He walked away, hanging his head, privately almost relieved. Sure, it was always fun to embarrass Hawkeye, but did he really want to know how long Hawk and Carol spent together? Of course they went to the Swamp together. That’s where Hawkeye’s cot was, wasn’t it? He knew it had gotten a lot of business since the war started, and he had no doubt a bright neon ‘open’ sign was lighting up over it right this minute.--------i've always thought mash needed another female lead, so imagine, if you will, a universe with a female surgeon thrown into the mix, even more elaborate pranking, margaret with an actual female friend, and a whole lot of repression from all parties involved. oh, plus hawkeye and bj getting themselves into all kinds of angst and elaborate fantasies about living out casablanca, of course.
Relationships: "Trapper" John McIntyre/Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce, B. J. Hunnicutt/Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce, B. J. Hunnicutt/Peg Hunnicutt, B.J. Hunnicutt & Original Female Character(s), Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce/Original Female Character(s), Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan & Original Female Character(s), Peg Hunnicutt & Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	1. only the lonely

Fog curled tenderly around the window panes, and moonlight filtered through the glass, creating patterns of silver and white on the linoleum floor of the kitchen. Carol sat perched on the counter, as she always liked to at this time of night; a time where chairs felt too ordinary, and a soft sort of silence was easy to settle into. A time of night where she felt wicked and beautiful and lost and lonely and serene and dangerous all at once. In her hands was a mug filled to the brim with gently steaming chamomile tea, and crumpled in her slender fingers was a piece of paper worn thin and soft.

The crackles of the record player filtered in from the other side of the small kitchen, and she became aware the record had spun to a close. Setting down her mug, she leapt lightly off the counter and replaced the needle, looping the song around again. The scratches and bumps and grain; they gave the record character, she had decided. They said that this record had been through hell and back, and still managed to keep its melody. She felt a little foolish for her attachment to this single record, but there was just something so beautiful about the wear of the grooves, the faded melody trembling out like gossamer wings on a spring breeze. 

_Y ou must remember this, a kiss is still a kiss, _ _ a sigh is just a sigh, the fundamental things apply, as time goes by... _

Carol found herself swaying without a partner; feeling the shadow of a tall, lanky body pressed against hers, a warm chest serving as a rest for her head, a delicate, yet decidedly masculine hand leading her around the kitchen. She unconsciously leaned up for a kiss but snapped back to reality when all she found on the other end was emptiness.

_ You hopeless romantic _ , she thought with a sad grin. How long had it been since they’d danced that close, how long since the sound of shells was silenced by Dooley Wilson’s raspy vibrato trembling out of an outdated phonograph? She was almost positive it’d been a year, until she became almost positive it was three. 

Maybe she should start marking the days off on her newest complimentary Avon calendar. Either that, or join AA, but she wasn’t one for giving in to the latent Catholic guilt her parents bestowed on her.

_ As time goes by.... _

The record began to fade out again, looping dusty crackles over and over. Carol deftly swung her long legs back onto the counter, feeling her dancing partner drift away, back into her imagination. Or was it her memory? They seemed to blur together nowadays. 

Her attention returned to the paper on the counter, and she picked up the crumpled note delicately, as though she were afraid it would burn her. Hesitantly, she unfolded it, feeling a slight blush of embarrassment. Would this make the tenth or eleventh time she’d opened the note this week? Well, it didn’t matter, it wasn’t like she ever got up the confidence to read it.

Carol drank in the mere sight of the spiky words on the page, but the minute she tried to settle in and truly  _ read _ , she had to turn away. She just couldn’t bring herself to face what it might say.

She just couldn’t face a past life that felt like it happened an eternity ago. Or was it a year? Or 6 months? Or had she just gotten home? 

Sometimes it felt like she was frozen on a bridge, watching herself walk by, without any concept of time or who she really was. __

Before she knew it, the note was slipped into her robe and she was dumping the tea down the sink and reaching into the cabinet above her head. A few minutes later, she had a perfectly dry martini in her hands. 

_ Do you really want to start this up again? Wouldn’t it be nice to be sober for a couple days, take in the sights of home? Just set it down and go to bed.  _

_Oh, hell, who are you trying to kid? It’s just one drink._ _One drink isn’t going to hurt a 31 year old war veteran. It’s just one drink._

It was never just one drink. 

Carol liked to say she never did anything by halves. She was either all in or she was all out, and lucky her! She had jumped straight into being an alcoholic like a kid in a swimming hole during a heat wave. She thought she’d be doing better with time, but if doing better meant making excuses, staying out all night drinking, and then promising she’d get sober the  _ very next day _ , it was a pretty shaky step in the right direction. 

Now it was two in the morning on a Tuesday, and she was past the point of drunk. How long had it been since she started drinking? Not casually, though she could lie to herself and say this was. How long had it been since she started getting drunk every night off? 

The days were simply too long to remember at this point. 

_ Too long?  _ Where had she heard that phrase before? It wasn’t at the bar last night, or at the grocer’s this morning. It must have been-

_ Shit _ .  _ Not now.  _

God, she hated it when she started remembering everything she’d tried to tuck away since she came home, but lately it seemed every time she tried to move past the war, her brain found a new way to help her remember she was a  _ veteran _ . Carol gasped audibly at the rapidly returning memory of piercing blue eyes, narrowed in anger, vicious words shredding the air around her. 

_ Oh god _ , she groaned inwardly.  _ This is the one I tried to forget _ . 

\-----------------

Captain Carol Campbell was having a shittier day than usual, and that was saying a lot coming from a meatball surgeon in the middle of a war zone. She’d woken up to the sound of the loudspeaker announcing new casualties and had been operating since oh-five-hundred hours. What time was it now? It could have been oh-six-hundred or it could have been a week later, it beat the hell out of her. 

She was cold, she was exhausted, she wanted a drink, and preferably a tall dark stranger and an apartment in Paris that they could stagger into at all hours of the night. 

_ The days here are just too long. _

“Captain! Last patient of the day!” shouted the corpsman, sliding another figure onto her table.

Carol didn’t move, her hands and apron still stained crimson from her last patient. Not that her painted apron meant she’d done anything worthwhile.

Colonel Potter glanced up at her, wire spectacles flashing, and a thin haze of concern in his eyes. “Campbell, you don’t have to operate.” he chanced, “BJ can take over for you, he’s almost finished.”

Carol glanced up, brown eyes cold and mouth set. “I can operate,” she said, stripping off her gloves. “He still has another patient waiting.”

“Are you sure?” Potter asked softly. 

Carol looked at Hawkeye, at BJ, then back at Potter. They were all working hard, like  _ good fucking surgeons _ , and she wasn’t going to leave them to pick up her slack.

“I’m sure.” She tried to sound firm and emotionless, but her voice wavered on the last syllable. 

BJ looked up at her, blue eyes softening with a smile she couldn’t see. She took a deep breath and looked away. 

“Nurse? Fresh gloves!”

\-----------------

Carol snapped back into reality, feeling the flowered brocade of the world’s ugliest secondhand couch under her fingertips. She didn’t remember stumbling into the living room. 

_ Swell, now you’re blacking out again! _

Through a brain foggy with sleep deprivation and gin, she struggled to focus on the pure anger in the blue eyes that had triggered her little episode in the first place. Or was that love? Lust? All three?

_ I really need to stop drinking,  _ she thought, mournfully.  _ Tomorrow, God, I promise I will stop drinking at this time of night, and maybe take in the sights and sounds of the bay or something. Amen. _ How hard it was to be so miserable all the time.

Her brain spit on her pathetic attempt at repentance, as she slowly started to remember the other pieces of the memory. Maybe she was getting too comfortable in her misery.

_ 3-0 silk, a heavy needle, the cart being wheeled out of the OR… and yelling? No, that was just the other surgeons singing. Wasn’t it? No. It was definitely yelling. _

_ But why yelling? One of the patients, maybe? Or did someone get hurt? Someone got hurt. That’s gotta be it. _

A fuzzy image hovered tantalizingly in her psyche, and Carol tried to shake the haze of gin out of her brain. She had to remember, she  _ had  _ to. It was important. Right? 

_ Oh no. _

Slowly, the image began to sharpen, and she remembered why she had forgotten this in the first place.

\-----------------

Carol had just sutured the last incision on the boy on her table, and was stripping off her gloves when she heard a yell. 

Her head snapped up and she saw a flurry of movement over on Hawkeye’s table. She recognized the rough up and down movement of chest compressions, dully registering the desperation in his eyes as he swung his fist down hard on his patient’s chest. Potter and BJ were still working, so she was the only surgeon free. 

Potter nodded grimly at her.

“LIVE goddamn you! You bastard, stay alive!” Hawkeye's rage filled pleas filled the small OR, as he pounded on a chest that had long gone silent.

Carol walked up behind him and tried to be a comfort, laying a slender hand on his shoulder.

“Hawkeye. Stop.” 

He looked at her, blue eyes wild and shining with exhaustion. 

“It’s over. It’s been over since you started. Just...move on.” 

The words came out colder than she’d planned, but it was too late to take them back. She silently withdrew her hand and drifted into the scrub room, in that dreamlike state where nothing mattered, everything hurt and she didn't feel quite like herself.

She was always the first in the scrub room to change, out of common courtesy for being the only female surgeon on the staff, and today especially, she relished the stillness and silence of the dingy walls and cracked basins. The dreamlike state didn’t last though, and too quickly, a wave of fatigue and pure grief crashed over her. 

Carol tiredly yanked off her apron, and shoved it into the hamper, tossing in her cap next. She stood in partially bloodied scrubs, and stuck her hands under the faucet trying desperately to rinse all the blood and grime out from under her nails. She wanted every reminder of this OR session gone, washed down the drain with the rest of her memories.

“Out damn spot,” she muttered to herself, smiling slightly, in the way she did when she knew she’d crossed into the sort of black humor that obliterated even her own personal boundary lines. 

She’d survive this, she’d move on, she’d drink, she’d force herself not to cry and she’d be back in here within a few days. Isn’t that how it always went? 

The door to the OR burst open, and she caught a glimpse of greying hair. 

_ Not now, Hawkeye, not now! _ She internally groaned, knowing very well she was about to be on the receiving end of an infamous Benjamin Franklin Pierce “I Hate The War And Everyone In It” speech. If he had any sense, he’d pick up on her mood, and just leave her the hell alone, but they didn’t give out doctorates in reading the room, and Hawkeye never would have received his if they did. 

The tall, lanky surgeon slouched through the double doors, clearly fuming, exhausted and in one of the worst moods she’d seen in a while. The look didn’t suit him, although sometimes it seemed like he’d been built for anger, with his dark hair, piercing eyes and atrocious posture. 

Carol half-looked up, then looked back down, focusing on scrubbing every square centimeter of her hands. 

_ If I ignore him, maybe he’ll just go away, _ she thought, feigning rapt interest in her fingernails _.  _

Of course, that didn’t deter Hawkeye, and she hadn’t really expected it would. He marched right in front of her in a single, fluid movement, and she could just about sense that god complex radiating outwards from his tense frame.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.

“Performing  _ Macbeth _ ,” she retorted cooly, “To think I became a surgeon instead of Shakespeare’s muse just tears me up inside.”

For once, Hawkeye had no mirth in his eyes, no love, no tenderness. Just pure unbridled pain. 

“That’s not what I meant and you know it damn well.”

Carol looked up calmly, barely controlling her frustration. “Then explain to me, oh surgeon of great temper and vague notions. What  _ do _ you mean so damn well?”

Hawkeye's eyes narrowed with jagged ice. “I'm chief surgeon here,  _ captain _ , which means I’m the one who has the final say on  _ all _ medical decisions. You may think you can waltz in here, all bright eyed and bushy tailed, and ready to help with the war effort, because you’re just that much of a hero, but some of us had no choice coming to this goddamn dissection lesson. So, next time, keep your volunteer input out of  _ my  _ OR.”

Carol was already in a thunderous mood, and the minute the famously unmilitary Hawkeye Pierce spit out the word  _ captain _ , she didn’t feel like hearing the rest of what he had to say. Part of her knew he was just blowing off steam, but the other half was hankering for a fight, and here was an opportunity for one, all packaged up and delivered to her in blood-stained ribbons. 

The latter feeling won her over when she involuntarily heard him shout out the rest of his little tirade. 

“Look on the bright side, Captain Pierce,” she chirped, eyes widening in mockery, “At least you aren’t missing the dysentery festival. I heard it’s half priced admission for draftees.”

She turned away from him and stalked over to the bench, yanking her fatigues off the hook.

Hawkeye wasn’t done with her though. “Oh, clever, clever,” he jeered. “Now you think you’re a better surgeon  _ and _ a funnier one at that.”

Without even looking at him, Carol flatly returned, “No. I  _ know _ I’m better.”

Maybe she just wanted to rile him up before she could get to the breaking point herself. Not that she’d ever admit it.

Hawkeye looked at her furiously, eyes blazing like blue starbursts, his jaw set in a rigid line. He took a single step towards her, but she held her ground calmly, anticipating his attack. 

Suddenly, jarringly, Carol’s world went black, but not too late for her to see the moment when Hawkeye exploded.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> link to song that titled the chapter: https://open.spotify.com/track/4WlpAuQ56wRA9IsGe6HIea?si=eT9PVbOqTuuSTB09h100jA


	2. tonight you belong to me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> don't worry, bj and hawkeye both get to speak in this chapter, although unfortunately they're still apart for the time being.  
> but there is a good old fashioned screaming match between characters, and a reunion, so i guess you'll just have to read on to see where that goes!

Carol felt herself yanked out of the memory as she crashed onto the narrow strip of floor between the couch and the coffee table. 

_ Damn it. _

She had spent so long trying to forget this day, and now all she wanted to do was remember. If she ever met Sigmund Freud, she was going to wring his mommy-loving neck for discovering repression. 

_ Think, think, think, damn it! What did he say? _

Carol lay on the threadbare rug for a few minutes, drawing shallow breaths, but no memory materialized in her mind. She frustratedly sat up, head spinning as she came to her senses a little too quickly, and she could feel all the blood rushing out of her head at once. 

_ Tomorrow, god, I'm going to be sober,  _ she groaned, whether in her head or out loud, she wasn’t sure.  _ I’ll be so dead sober you’ll think I’ve sold my soul. _

“Maybe I have,” she hears herself say, voice crackly, “in exchange for a couple erotic war memoirs.” She knew she’d lost it when she cackled at her own feeble joke. It sure would’ve been nice to receive a little flashback as a treat for being so goddamned clever.

_ Just give me the trauma when I ask for it and hide it when I don’t, it’s that simple!  _

Carol buried her head under one of the couch pillows and only when she’d been in darkness for ten minutes, half-asleep, a hazy image began to worm its way into her barely-conscious mind.

_ Watch out Sigmund, I’ve got a bat with your name on it _ . 

\-----------------

Hawkeye Pierce was not an imposing man. Carol remembered when he introduced himself with a shit-eating grin, a waggle of the eyebrows, and those long legs flying all over the place as he tripped over himself to grab her suitcase and a little bit of her arm. 

“I heard you’re the hottest new surgeon since Russell Nelson,” he’d cracked. “How about you teach me how to play doctor? I know a great clinic we can practice in.”

The man standing in front of her now was none of the man she’d met all those years ago. Or was it months? Weeks? A lifetime? 

His face hardened into angles she hated on impact, hated them because he didn’t deserve to have so many lines at such a young age, didn’t deserve to be greying at the temples and drinking his years, weeks, days away. Maybe she was projecting her own issues onto him, but the weariness of his eyes told her otherwise.

_ But, then again, you should take a look at yourself. I bet Peter wouldn’t even recognize you now.  _

Carol frantically shook herself out of that memory by bracing for Hawkeye’s imminent tirade, trying desperately to come back into the present. 

She heard a dull clatter as Hawkeye stalked up to her, kicking over the laundry hamper in the process. Whether intentionally or clumsily, she couldn’t tell, but it was enough to awaken her to the sounds of Hawkeye’s voice.

“Because you stopped me, I lost him! Did they teach you to lose patients in medical school, or were you too busy showing your legs to any professor who’d pass you?” 

Hawkeye’s insult was sexist and below-the-belt, but it almost made her want to laugh.  _ He sounds like a little boy who just learned that sometimes life isn’t fair. _

Hawkeye was sneering now, and it wasn’t an attractive look on him. “You thought that you may as well round out the day on an even number? Losing one wasn’t beating your personal record or something? We finally get rid of Frank Burns, and you immediately want to fill his army-licking boots?” 

Carol Campbell was tired, she was miserable, she was depressed, she was on her way to becoming a high-functioning alcoholic at the age of 28, but most of all, she was furious.

How  _ dare _ this man speak to her this way, as though he were the only surgeon with a heart? How  _ dare _ he mock her efforts to keep every man on her table alive? How  _ dare _ he try and sate his own inferiority complex by gouging straight into her own? And worst of all, how  _ dare _ he blame something like this on  _ her _ , as if she were the God of the MASH unit and had decided she wanted a couple men to lose their lives because she was  _ bored _ , or something?

“You may have been the crackerjack new surgeon back in San Francisco,” Hawkeye continued mockingly, “But in case you haven’t noticed, there are kids’  _ lives _ on the line here. And these kids are gonna keep dying unless you stand back and work like the meatball surgeon you’re supposed to be. But I guess you aren’t a meatball surgeon!” 

He pushed in even closer until they were practically nose to nose. “You’re just a girl who decided she  _ had _ to come to Korea and play hero, and maybe when she gets back she can tell all the ladies in her sewing circle how terrible it all was, but how damn lucky the soldiers were to have her! You chose to come to this hellhole, so why the hell aren’t you making it count?” 

Hawkeye finished his tirade with the sort of smug anger she’d seen him direct at battalion leaders or figures of authority who just didn’t care to understand how bloody the work they commanded was. 

She refused to let him direct it at her.

Carol Campbell was not an imposing woman. She stood five foot seven and possessed a slim boyish figure that was remarkably petite in comparison to Hawkeye’s six foot two stance. Not that this mattered when every single molecule in her body was bursting with adrenaline, steel, and pure fury. She threw her fatigues down on the bench, and turned around for the first time, advancing on the smug surgeon.

“What is it about you,  _ captain _ ,” she spit, “That makes you think you have the right to take out your own frustrations on everyone around you? You know goddamn well there’s no goddamn record any surgeon in this goddamn country is trying to beat. Oh! Except for the one where we all try and see who’ll get to be on the receiving end of our own  _ chief surgeon _ chewing us out for simply  _ being human  _ the most often!”

Hawkeye’s eyes widened in shock as he stepped backwards, driving his back into a basin.

_ I bet the nurses never speak to him like this _ , her psyche jeered. 

_ Yeah, well, I bet the nurses weren’t directly responsible for losing a patient,  _ she snapped back, arguing with herself in a split second before her next well-placed blow.

“You lost a patient, Hawkeye. You saved all the rest, and just because I told you to stop beating a dead horse, that doesn’t make you any less of a surgeon. Or maybe it does, in your eyes, because frankly your inferiority complex could fill Yankee Stadium, and that’s without the ego on top of it! 

You know what I think? I think you’re  _ jealous _ , I think you’re jealous of my skill as a surgeon, and I think you’re intimidated that a woman like me could survive this hellhole just as well as you. But then again, none of us are truly surviving, are we? 

I may be a volunteer but I’m still  _ stuck here _ with lousy food, blood in my boots, and the fear that I’m going to go to sleep one day and never wake up again. So maybe it’s high time you check your ego at the door and realize that this war will go on with or without you, and- and- and that the rest of us are working just as  _ damn hard as you  _ to save EVERY life that comes through on those gurneys!”

Hawkeye was now slouched against the basin, aghast. Carol took his weakness to hit her point home.

“No matter how hard you try to forget, how many martinis you swallow, no matter how bare your lapels are, you’re still a captain in the  _ fucking _ army, Benjamin Franklin Pierce! So go on, try and accuse everyone around you of being a McCarthyist or a bootlicker, or of supporting the war effort, or- or- or whatever else you try and lie to yourself with. Put on your cowboy hat and your Hawaiian shirt and pretend you’re the only one around here with common sense and a heart on your sleeve, but maybe someday you’ll take a long, good look in the mirror and realize you’re just the same as the rest of us. Alcoholic, miserable and a servant of the United States FUCKING Army! Then, while you’re there, take stock of your chauvinistic opinions and realize I’m just as  _ damn good of a surgeon _ as you are! And you know what? You’d be lucky to even dream of having a pair of legs as  _ fantastic _ as mine!”

Fire blazed in the female captain’s chocolate colored eyes as she stalked to the bench and snatched up her fatigues. There was no way she was even going to entertain the possibility of changing in here with him. Stalking towards the door, nose in the air, she could almost feel the eyes of the OR staff on her back, a strange sensation when mixed with the pure heat in her cheeks and ice in her veins. 

Then, a hand reached out for her shoulder, and spun her around. She looked up into eyes that showed so much emotion, she wasn’t sure which one she hoped it was. Was he angry? Most definitely. Was he feeling guilty? She could only hope. 

Was he… aroused? 

_ What the hell are you thinking? Better go get drunk before you form any more cohesive thoughts. God, I hate you sometimes. All the time.  _

Carol raised an eyebrow. “Coming back to grovel so soon?” she sniped. 

Hawkeye opened his mouth, then closed it again. She was very aware of the contact points his fingers were digging into her shoulder blade, and then she wondered why she was so aware of them. He opened his mouth again. 

“I- You- You’re..” he stuttered, and then without warning she felt his hand leave her shoulder and reach around to cup her jaw. She looked into those heavy-lidded blue eyes, his long eyelashes casting shadows on high cheekbones, felt the heat radiating off his face and saw a flush spreading across his nose and cheeks. 

Then, his lips were on hers, and she could feel his shuddering breaths against her chest. She felt the full length of her body go numb and all at once the world screeched to a halt. 

_ Tell me you’re not kissing the man you just chewed out for five minutes! Tell me you’re not kissing the man who just degraded you in front of all your friends!  _

_ Shut up, Carol _ ,  _ and don’t you dare ruin this for me _ , she argued back, leaning further into the embrace, feeling the rough scrape of stubble against her neck as he pushed closer against her. She felt her back slam against the sink basin and she gasped. This wasn’t romantic, this wasn’t sweet, this wasn’t even sexual. This felt like survival, and every minute that man’s tongue was in her mouth was another minute she’d stay alive.

Until his hands gripped her hips, and she looked up at that beautifully tousled salt and pepper hair, and his lips ended up between her teeth, and then he pulled away, breathing like he’d just run five miles at high altitude. That was probably a little more than survival.

They stood there in the aftermath, avoiding looking at each other, Carol’s almond-shaped eyes cast downward, Hawkeye’s lanky body curled in on itself.

“Uh, I won’t kiss and tell,” he muttered, shuffling a little towards the door, and Carol snorted out of pure shock. Hawkeye made a strangled little sound that might have been nervous laughter or possibly an opossum impression. 

Carol couldn’t help it, that made her laugh, which caused Hawkeye to laugh, which opened the floodgates of hysterical laughter, not so much from joy as from delirium stemming from being awake for a couple days.

Rolling waves of shrieks and yells and pure uncontrolled noise filled the tiny room as Carol and Hawkeye doubled up, clutching onto each other. 

“You- you wanna get a drink?” Hawkeye gasped, in between laughs.

Carol just nodded, unable to speak, and Hawkeye slung an arm around her shoulders as they walked out into the darkened compound, both cackling as they went. 

\-----------------

Carol woke up the next morning with a ferocious headache, a longing for the past and a need to get out of her house. 

Of  _ course _ she’d fallen asleep at the most pivotal moment of a memory she could barely remember. She pried herself off of the couch, and cleared empty glasses off the coffee table. She always hated to see those glasses in the cold light of day. 

Opening the curtains, she winced at the bright light washing through the glass.  _ What time was it?  _

She didn’t really want to find out, she just wanted to leave. Escape. Run away and reminisce in some empty field of lavender. Yes, that would be nice, all the quiet space and the heavenly scent and the stalks gently waving in the breeze.

She wanted to talk about the war, about that miserable day she knew she hadn’t quite remembered the last of, about her friends, about the blood, the pain. She shoved aside the thought of the one person she’d like to talk about it, because she was a big fan of the repression theory (in theory). 

_ Who was there that day? Who could I speak to? I need- I need to talk to someone who understands. Colonel Potter… is not exactly a “catch up over coffee” type and I don’t even like Missouri. Besides, ol’ Doc Potter is retired, and he doesn’t need me shattering the peace. _

_ Margaret… Yeah, Margaret! I can talk to  _ her _ about anything. To Margaret’s we go! _

_ Margaret lives on the other side of the country, and your telephone has been off the hook for months,  _ the rational side of her brain supplied.

_ Oh good lord, Carol _ .  _ Why don’t you have a backbone for once in your life?  _

She had woken up knowing who she wanted to talk to; enough of this beating around the bush.

Carol padded into her bedroom, and grabbed the suitcase she kept under her bed for times like this, when she just needed to run away. She was ashamed to think of all the times she’d just… driven away since the war ended. She’d seen her fair share of seedy roadside motels, that’s for sure, and all the unsavory characters that came with the property. 

She selected a pair of gingham trousers and a red sweater from her drawers, only pausing to run her fingers over an embroidered pair of overalls, before she buried them under more pants and slammed the drawer shut. 

Hastily shoving her legs into the trousers, Carol grabbed a brush and ran it through a tangled mess of auburn hair, cringing as her hair pulled under the bristles. That, mixed with the headache was  _ some _ wake-up call.

After a couple minutes of struggling to reset her hair, she gave up and tied a scarf around her head, turning away to avoid her reflection as she walked by the mirror over her dresser. Tossing the brush into her suitcase for later, she turned out the light, and walked out of the room, but something stopped her in the hallway. 

_ Go!  _ her brain screamed at her.  _ Just leave! You don’t need it, you don’t need it, you don’t  _ need _ it! _

Running back into her small bedroom, she rummaged in a dish of jewelry before pulling out the pin she affixed to her sweater every time she left the house. A golden caduceus.

_ I bet an analyst would have a lot to say about you _ .  _ You drink to forget, then you vow to stop drinking so you can remember, then you spend all your time carrying around memories of the worst time of your life, which also happens to be what you drink to forget to remember.  _

Carol threw her suitcase in the trunk and got into the front seat of her car. It would take maybe thirty minutes to get where she wanted to, but she had to steady herself. Was it rude to show up unannounced, maybe a little drunk, definitely hungover, looking like she got hit by a train?

_ That’s how he saw you every day in Korea, Carol. I think as long as you don’t cry or have a nervous breakdown within the first five minutes, it’ll be a perfect reunion. Just like the good ol’ days! _

Starting the car, Carol pulled out of the parking space in front of her apartment. She could see the Golden Gate Bridge from here, which was perfectly stereotypical, although it was a stereotype she relished the sight of every time she left. About halfway through the drive, the radio began playing a song all too familiar.

_ I know, (I know)  _ _ / You belong to somebody new / But tonight you belong to me _

This was some sort of punishment, or a cruel prank pulled on one alcoholic, repressed war veteren by an equally cruel universe. It was also more commonly known as one of the latest hit songs, and god, she hated it with a burning passion.

_ Although (Although) we're apart / You're a part of my heart / And tonight you belong to me _

She was going to write an angry letter to those kids’ manager. Or maybe she’d write a letter to the East Coast again. Or maybe she’d get good and drunk and listen to  _ As Time Goes By _ again. 

_ What a vicious cycle of a life you lead.  _

Carol reached and shut off the radio. She preferred silence anyways.

Thirty minutes later, Carol had pulled up in front of a perfectly charming white-picket fence surrounded home. The path was lined with immaculate squares of green grass, and yellow roses bloomed in little manicured plots. Everything was so perfectly suburban, she didn’t even need to check the address on the letter she was holding. Oh, and the motorcycle skidded halfway across a plot of daisies pretty much confirmed she was at the right house. 

Taking a deep breath, Carol climbed out of her car, adjusting the scarf in the hair she didn’t have time to curl. She walked up the spotless concrete path, noticing how even the blades of grass seemed aware of their place in this divided land of a front yard, and hesitated only slightly before steeling her nerves and knocking on a door that was painted- unsurprisingly- a light shade of yellow to match the roses. 

She stood there, tapping her foot and wringing her hands for a minute, and just as she was about to knock again, the door opened. A slim, blonde woman in a skirt and sweater, cinched at the waist with a wide belt, opened the door. This woman was the very picture of American suburbia, but somehow she was more intimidating than anyone Carol had ever met.

“Yes?” the woman asked.

Carol cleared her throat nervously. “Are you- are you- Mrs. Hunnicutt?”

“If you want me to be.” The woman smiled a little, but it didn’t calm Carol’s nerves. “And please, everyone calls me Peg.”

_ Peg. _

“Uh, I’m Carol..uh, Campbell? I don’t know if he’s- I’m here to see BJ.” 

Peg’s eyebrows creased, then she broke into a grin. “Of course! The infamous Captain Campbell! I’ve heard a lot about you, you know.”

“All good things, I hope,” Carol smiled tightly.

“Ah, I’m afraid I’ve heard you can be quite wicked-”

_ Fuck. _

“When you’re not preoccupied being one of the best friends my husband’s ever had,” Peg finished contently. “Where are my manners? Please, come in, and I’ll call BJ in from the garage. You may have noticed we had a little...accident.” She gestured at the motorcycle in the flowers, then motioned for Carol to come in, stepping into the house to call her husband.

Carol stepped softly across the threshold, into a living room bursting with color and coordinating decor that was only fitting for the picture-perfect family that lived here. She couldn’t imagine living a life like this now. Sure, she’d dreamed of a house like this when she was in college, but not  _ now _ , as Dr. Campbell, the 31-year-old case study Freud would salivate over. 

_ Maybe I shouldn’t have come. I don’t deserve to be darkening their lives like this. _

Peg walked back into the room and looked at Carol curiously, almost as if she could read her thoughts. 

“Please, sit down Carol. Can I call you Carol?” Her voice was lower than Carol had imagined it would sound like, more similar to her own, yet it contained a sweetness that Carol knew she lacked herself.

Carol nodded. “I’m sorry for dropping in on you like this.” 

The sadness in Carol’s voice shocked her. She was usually better at putting up fronts, but then again, she’d just about drunk her weight in gin less than eight hours before. 

Peg turned towards her, a stern look in those warm brown eyes. “Don’t you dare apologize. BJ is just about driving me crazy with all the pining for his friends he’s been doing for the past three years. It’s about time you came to see him! Letters only say so much, you know.”

_ Ain’t that the truth. _

__ Before Carol could think of a reply, a six foot four, shaggy-haired man ducked through an archway into the room, his face lit up with a grin so wide it could have illuminated a theater. 

“Carol!” BJ crowed, crossing the space between them in two long strides and wrapping her up in an enormous hug. She hugged back ferociously, melting into a warmth she’d missed for three years, and before she knew it there were tears in her eyes. As they pulled apart, she noticed BJ’s eyes were equally as watery.

“You dope,” she choked out. “I promised myself I wasn’t going to cry.”

“It’s been three years, Carol! You expected  _ not _ to cry?” BJ smiled, but she could see the tears crinkling out of the corners of his eyes as she clutched at his forearms.

Peg had been quietly watching the exchange before excusing herself. “I hope you don’t think it rude of me, but I’ve been meaning to make a grocery run. I’ll leave you lovers alone.”

Carol’s head snapped back towards BJ and then they both burst into hysterical laughter, mixed with the shaky tears of reunion.

“Lover?” Carol giggled out. “I’m afraid I’m not one for blondes.”

“And you’re  _ much _ too tall for my personal tastes.” he fired back good-naturedly.

“We’ll make it work though,” Carol cracked, “I’d hate to disappoint mother.”

“Mother? I thought we were eloping!” 

Peg smiled quietly to herself as she slipped out the door. Hopefully these two would do each other some good.

As BJ and Carol’s hysterics died down, they sank onto the bright red couch, and sat in silence for a moment. She noticed BJ’s eyes roaming over her face and his expression turned more serious than she’d ever seen it.

“I know I’m no Marilyn Mon-” she started weakly, but was interrupted.

“Carol, what happened to you?”

“Oh, you know, a little place called Korea.”

“Carol, I was in Korea, remember? You looked better in the middle of a war zone than you do now. You’re ferociously thin, you have eyebags that could rival a racoon’s, and whenever you speak, it’s like someone tuned into the depression radio.”

He paused, then tapped on the caduceus pinned to her sweater. “And this.”

Carol had always appreciated BJ’s matter-of-fact attitude, but not so much when it was directed at her. She planned to follow up with a snappy retort, but what followed was anything but.

“I missed you, BJ.”

BJ grasped her hands and looked into those tired brown eyes with his own equally haunted blue ones.

“I did too, Carol.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if alan alda could hand hawkeye's ass to him on a platter, then so can i, right? of course, i love hawkeye, so there will be redeeming dialogue in the next chapter, but it was kind of fun to get mean for a little bit.  
> as the story continues, it's going to branch out and tell the story from different characters' points of view, so we don't all have to suffer through miss carol's incurable trauma all the time. i may have written too many interweaving plot points, but what's the fun of writing if not to decipher your own 3 am plotlines?
> 
> link to song that titled the chapter: https://open.spotify.com/track/77MHOLfTVDlhcX0yDr23Uu?si=Hobzmf-oRDKLqD1R7KS3Gg
> 
> as always, comments and kudos would be appreciated and thank you to everyone who's taken the time to read my ball and chain!!
> 
> come chat with me on tumblr @giaucherie ;)


	3. girl talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> well, well, well, hawkeye and carol sittin' in a tree...
> 
> hawkeye and carol do end up alone, but not so much in the way you'd think. meanwhile, bj plans elaborate betting schemes in order to get back at hawkeye. for what exactly? well, that's up to nobody but bj's own insecurities.

Colonel Potter, BJ, Father Mulcahy and Margaret all walked into the scrub room, in utter shock and total silence. It was like the set-up for a bad joke.

“Good god,” murmured Margaret. “I knew those two were too alike for their own good.”

Colonel Potter removed his glasses and wiped them on his apron, like they’d somehow been so smudged, what he’d just seen was a trick of the light.

Meanwhile, BJ was grinning so widely it seemed like his face was about to split open. 

“Well, well, well. Hawkeye and Carol, hmm?” 

He glanced over at Father Mulcahy who was trying his hardest to look as though he hadn’t immediately caught onto what BJ was implying.

“You  _ know, _ Colonel, Margaret, Father... I believe there’s a little money to be won off our friends’ torrid little affair.”

“What?” Margaret gave him a steely look.“I thought that  _ was _ their ‘torrid little affair.’”

“Hawkeye Pierce and Carol Campbell just stuck their tongues down each other’s throats in the _scrub_ _room_ and you think that was _it_? The two people in camp who never leave a job less than finished?” BJ’s grin widened into something downright wicked.

“What are you getting at, Hunnicutt?” Potter commanded.

“Well, Colonel,” he lilted, “Think about it. Hawkeye and Carol, two of our finest and most favorite officers just left together. I do believe there are three places our star-crossed lovers might end up in next.” 

He moved as if to walk away, knowing full well everyone’s attention was only on him. 

Now it was Margaret’s turn to grimace. “Get to the point, BJ.”

“Isn’t it obvious?” he crooned, slowly pivoting and batting his eyelashes, a habit he’d clearly picked up from Hawkeye.

“Just tell us, Hunnicutt!” barked Colonel Potter.

“Well, I’d say the Officer’s Club, the Swamp, or the supply tent.”

All three officers turned to their left, aghast at the words that had just come out of their very pleased-looking priest’s mouth.

“Like BJ said,” Father Mulcahy smiled, in a way that seemed both innocent and incredibly sacrilegious, “I thought it was obvious.”

\-----------------

Carol felt her heart pounding as Hawkeye’s hip bumped against her side while he practically honked with laughter. She didn’t know where they were going, what the hell had just happened, and even better, why she was so close to him in the first place. Hadn’t he just given her absolute hell for something she couldn’t control? She’d stopped laughing as soon as the initial shock of the kiss (as if it were chaste enough to be summarized that way!) wore off, and Hawkeye’s honking laugh died down as soon as he realized she’d gone silent. 

“Carol, are you alright?” he asked, backpedaling a little as she abruptly stopped. Forget graduating, if reading the room was a major, no college would accept Hawkeye in the first place _. _

“Gosh, I don’t know,” she responded, in a tone absolutely dripping with sarcasm. “Let’s review the events of the last 5 minutes. I told you to stop giving a dead patient chest compressions, you accused me of killing your patient, you implied that the  _ only _ reason I’m a doctor is because I slept my way through medical school, I screamed at you for treating me like I’m somehow inferior to you, I  _ believe  _ I called you by your full name, then you stuck your tongue down my throat and I  _ retaliated _ !” Her voice rose in crescendo with each listed item, attracting stares and whispers from passing enlisted men and nurses. 

Hawkeye looked nervously around, giving that tight lipped smile of his to anyone within earshot of Carol’s angry barrage.

“Uh, look, Carol, can we talk about this somewhere where I don’t feel quite so… objectified?” Hawkeye offered a weak smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes and Carol almost laughed. 

_ He really just asked  _ you  _ not to objectify him? After he just slammed your character into the dirt five minutes ago? Please. You’re better off taking a dive into the latrine than hearing him out. _

Hawkeye pointed limply in the direction of the Swamp, as if to say,  _ How about there?  _

Carol nodded silently. She’d never taken her own advice before, and she wasn’t about to start now. 

\-----------------

Carol tapped her fingers along the rim of her coffee cup while BJ quietly refilled his own. “You tried to forget too,” he smiled sadly. “But the war persists merrily on in memory, didn’t you know?”

“I think we all tried to forget,” Carol returned cautiously. She wasn’t ready for this discussion, especially not without a drink in hand. 

They lapsed into silence again, both lost in thoughts the other was hesitant to decipher, when all of a sudden they both spoke at once.

“You rat! I didn’t know you took bets-”

“He really can be an ass sometimes-”

“You first?”

“No, go ahead you’re the guest-”

“I’d hope I’m more than a guest-”

“Sorry, I already have a wife-”

“I knew I was doomed to be an old maid-”

“Oh, shit!”

Carol’s wide grin faltered. “What’d I say?”

BJ looked at her apologetically. “No, nothing personal, it’s just that it’s four o’clock. I have to pick up Erin from her friend’s in half an hour. It takes half an hour to get there, and this  _ friend _ wouldn’t exactly appreciate a late pick-up.”

“You don’t mind if I come with you, do you?”

“You  _ want _ to? There’s liable to be a temper tantrum.”

“My sister’s kids think I’m the greatest person in the world, I’ll have you know. I’m a regular mediator, especially when the dolls get to fighting.”

BJ smiled again. “Alright, Captain Peacemaker, let’s see you work your magic. Hopefully you’ll be a better diplomat than Hawk was at the peace talks.”

Carol didn’t mean to flinch, but she knew she had when BJ’s eyes filled with concern.

“It’s just- the word- you know-  _ captain _ ,” she finished lamely, but was grateful when BJ didn’t press the issue. 

BJ motioned towards a door. “Garage is this way.”

“But didn’t Peg just go to the store?”

BJ’s eyes crinkled. “She walks to the grocery store, it’s just around the corner, and she claims she needs the fresh air. I think it’s the Midwesterner in her.”

_ Imagine living a life this peaceful. _

\-----------------

BJ smiled his million-watt smile, the one that showed all of his teeth, in the most lascivious way he could muster. Margaret was the first to slap five dollars into his hand. 

“Next time you ask me to bet on something as stupid as this, I’ll snap your garter belt, Hunnicutt!” she groused.

Father Mulcahy was next, with a quick glance upwards, and a muttered phrase under his breath that sounded very much like “....teach you how to box….”

Colonel Potter simply handed BJ the five, and BJ retaliated by giving him the most innocent smile he could possibly plaster on. Colonel Potter glared back, growling, “Hunnicut, if you tell a  _ single blessed soul  _ about any of this, you’ll be digging latrines faster than Klinger can zip up an evening gown!”

“Hey, hey, no need to intimidate me, Colonel! Why don’t we all head to the Officer’s Club and make a little whoopee. Drinks on me, now that I’m a couple dollars richer!” BJ winked.

Margaret glared at him. “Why do I get the feeling that saying yes will get me into even more debt?”

BJ clutched his chest in mock agony. “Why, Margaret! How could you even  _ imply _ such a thing!”

Father Mulcahy chimed in, “If it makes you feel any better, BJ, I too assumed there was a catch to your offer.”

BJ cast his eyes downward. “Even my own priest doesn’t think I’m trustworthy.”

Margaret rolled her eyes, “ _ Fine _ , I’ll get a drink with you BJ, but if you have any more little games you plan on playing, you better get them out into the open  _ now _ .”

BJ widened his eyes innocently. “Double or nothing on how long they’ll be in there?”

He felt a slap on his arm, and turned with a grin, expecting a glare from Margaret.

“BJ, you rat!” cried Father Mulcahy. “I- I usually don’t step in on matters like this, but, but THIS- this is lecherous and immoral!”

“Well, Father, I’d certainly hope so. After all, that’s how the best money is made.”

“Well  _ I _ for one refuse to take part in it. I could care less about Captain Pierce, but Captain Campbell is my friend,” Margaret cut in.

BJ swiveled towards her. “Margaret,” he pleaded, “What else are friends for if not to exploit their other friends?”

"Sorry, Hunnicutt,” Colonel Potter cut in, “But this is one bet I can’t partake in. It just ain’t  _ right _ .”

BJ sighed in mock disappointment. “I sure wish Hawkeye was here, I bet he’d bet.”

He walked away, hanging his head, privately almost relieved. Sure, it was always fun to embarrass Hawkeye, but did he  _ really _ want to know how long Hawk and Carol spent together? Of course they went to the  _ Swamp _ together. That’s where Hawkeye’s cot was, wasn’t it? He knew it had gotten a lot of business since the war started, and he had no doubt a bright neon ‘open’ sign was lighting up over it right this minute.

_ It’s none of your business what a grown man chooses to do with his free time _ , he thought.  _ It’s not! He’s not married so let him do what he wants. Let him do anything he wants. Let him do  _ anyone  _ he wants.  _

He could feel the anger rising in his chest, so just before he left, he turned around in mock play. It was always best to hide anger through elaborate schemes, because then nobody could tell you were truly emotionally unstable!

“Alright, so no bets!” he cheered falsely, “But the first round at the O Club is still on me… unless you’re the last one there, and then  _ you’re  _ buying.” He turned on his heel and dashed out the door, hearing Margaret scream at him somewhere in the background, but for now, only focusing on this delicious feeling of escape and the sweet anticipation of forgetting.

\-----------------

Inside the Swamp, Hawkeye was frantically buzzing around like a swarm of irritable bees, practically tripping over his feet every time he threw aside another dirty sock or nudist magazine.

“Can I offer you a drink? We only serve the finest ether, made out of first-rate swill,” he cracked.

Carol simply nodded, and, shoving aside a knitting project that looked suspiciously like a pair of wool boxers, she took a seat on one of the cots. Hawkeye turned around with a martini glass in his hand, saw her sitting on his cot, and his eyes crinkled at the corners in the way they did when he was about to make an incredibly indecent proposition. Fortunately, he seemed to think better of the situation for once, and simply handed her the martini.

“Thank you.” Those were the first words she’d spoken in the five minutes it took them to settle here in the first place.

“You’re welcome.” Hawkeye flopped into the chair next to his cot, and it amazed Carol how a grown man could have so little control over his own limbs. They sat in silence for a minute until Hawkeye spoke.

“So,” he muttered, “Uh, you’re, uh, mad at me.” Carol lifted her martini glass and raised her eyebrows in response. “I think I can guess why,” he smiled sheepishly.

“Your powers of deduction astound me.” 

Hawkeye’s face sagged once again into lines and wear, and she almost felt pity for him. He’d aged ten years in three seconds, and it wasn’t even light enough to see all the grey in his hair. 

“So, you probably think I’m the world’s biggest jerk, or the world’s biggest pervert, huh?” he smiled sadly.

“I’d compromise for the world’s biggest perverk.” Unwillingly, she felt her mouth quirk slightly upwards.

Hawkeye laughed a little, but there was sadness behind it. “You’re right. It’s just… I hate this place so goddamn much, and, and I, uh, I guess I kind of, uh, took my anger out on you. It was wrong, and I- I’m sorry.  _ God _ . I’m sorry, I’m an idiot really. It’s just hard for me to understand why anyone would come here  _ voluntarily _ .”

_ Voluntarily. Yeah. _

Carol tried not to let the pain show, but Hawkeye’s face immediately twisted with grief once he registered that he’d hurt her again.

“ _ God _ , nobody does it like me. I’m- I’m-  _ god- _ I’m sorry, Carol. I don’t even know what I said that time, but then again, I don’t know why I said what I said five minutes ago.”

_ He’s rambling _ . 

“I- oh god- and you’d just lost a patient too. Oh  _ god _ . What was that kid’s name? Peter? I-” He cut himself off abruptly as Carol’s entire body seemed to collapse, life draining out of her face as quickly as she drained the martini.

“Was it something I said?” he asked.

Carol shook her head, then nodded, and reached for the container of gin on the table. Her throat felt dry and thick, and cold, and numb, and she barely whispered the name.

“Peter.”

“Did you know him?” Hawkeye asked gently.

“No.” she answered curtly. “That’s the problem.” 

Her voice cracked on the last word again, and before she knew it hot tears were spilling out of her eyes. She watched them drip onto her olive drab clad thighs as she looked down, trying to swallow through the pain in her throat. Hawkeye sat frozen, like a deer in headlights as she took deep, heaving breaths trying to calm herself. God, she hated to cry in front of people. She hated to cry. She hated it. _ I hate it. I hate it. I hate you.  _

She heard a creak and felt a weight drop down next to her, and turned to see Hawkeye perched a little awkwardly next to her. She tried to scoot away, but he silently gathered her small frame into his arms, and let her rest her head on his chest.

Captain Carol Campbell prided herself on not letting her emotions get the best of her, but on this shitty night in Korea, they practically drop-kicked her into a foxhole. She didn’t remember how long she was in Hawkeye’s arms, but she  _ did _ remember the racking sobs shuddering out of her body, feeling her tears stain his fatigues, smelling surgery soap and musk and her own shampoo, and feeling a firm, gentle hand carding through the back of her hair. 

Even as her sobs quieted down into tears, then soft sniffles, Hawkeye held her firmly to his chest, and she was grateful for the warmth and support his bony frame offered. Hawkeye may have been impulsive and silly and insensitive at times, but right now, she was grateful, albeit humiliated, that he had her in his arms. 

When she pulled back, she looked aside, embarrassed at being caught at such a low point. She usually saved these outbursts for when she was alone in her cot, when Margaret was on duty in post-op, and the rest of the camp was asleep.

Hawkeye laid that strong, yet delicate hand under her jaw and softly tilted her face towards him. Wordlessly, he wiped the tears off her cheeks with his sleeve, and she braved a look  into those eyes that had seemed so stormy a few minutes? hours? days? ago. Now they were full of emotion again, an emotion so fiercely protective she was almost frightened.

“Hawkeye-” she scratched out.

“You don’t have to tell me anything,” he assured her, “This place gets to everyone once in a while. I was living proof back there.”

“I-” she stammered. “Thank you.”

“Anytime,” he smiled, his eyes crinkling into a true grin. “And just for the record, I owe you about five hundred favors for what I put you through in the scrub room. Favors aren’t enough. I deserve a court-martial, or, or a battalion aid deployment. If you wanted me to get into one of Klinger’s dresses, I’d do it. I’d do anything.” She noticed a softer intonation to the last word, and half-smiled, remnants of tears still spilling out of her eyes.

“You don’t-”

“Yes, I do.”

Carol looked into his lined face, shadowed with fatigue, and felt her own lines deepen. She knew, deep down, what she wanted, but she would never admit it. She could  _ never _ admit it.

“There is  _ one _ thing I’d like from you at the moment,” she murmured a little sheepishly, if only to take her mind off the previous thought. 

“Yes?” Their noses were practically touching.

“I want you to dance with me. I haven’t danced in months.”

He pulled back a little, surprised. “Dance?”

“Like Fred and Ginger,” she smiled. “You grew up with them, so you should know all the steps.”

Hawkeye gasped, “Are you implying I’m  _ old _ ?”

Carol smiled sweetly. “Only if that’s the way you choose to take it.”

Hawkeye grinned back, then stretched his long legs out into a standing position, offering her his hand. Then, he withdrew it and frowned. “Damn it.”

“What?”

“All we have in here are Charles’s  _ Tchaikovsky  _ records. Every day it’s  _ Tchaikovsky  _ this, _ Tchaikovsky  _ that. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think Charles and Tchaikovsky were estranged lovers.”

Carol snorted into her gin, feeling more than a little tipsy now that the tears had dried. Hawkeye looked back at her from across the tent and grinned again, laughing a little as he saw her spit gin across the Swamp. Carol’s delirium took over, and once Hawkeye saw her howling with laughter, he started in with that funny, over-enthusiastic laugh of his. Carol got up from the bunk, doubling over, and replaced the martini glass on the table. Rather, she  _ tried  _ to replace the martini glass on the table, but it slipped out of her fingers and plummeted towards the ground. Luckily, the wool boxers were still on the ground from where she’d tossed them earlier, and the glass’s fall was cushioned; instead of shattering, it rolled underneath the table holding the still. She clumsily crawled underneath the table to grab the glass, but as she made her way into the small space she noticed a flash of white sticking out from one of the corners.

She frowned as she noticed a small paper envelope wedged into the crack of the table, and carefully tried to extract it, martini glass forgotten. She could hear Hawkeye’s cackles behind her as she pried the envelope out of its hiding place. 

It was thicker than she realized, almost perfectly hidden, and clearly had been down there for a while. It felt like a single record, which was already hard enough to come by in Korea, so to find one hidden under a distillery was certainly not something she had anticipated ever doing. 

_ What an odd place to store a record.  _

She carefully lifted it out of the package, and in the dim light, neither she nor Hawkeye noticed the page covered in loopy handwriting floating to the floor. 

_ As Time Goes By… from Casablanca, wasn’t it? Fitting. _

Hawkeye walked over to her, still laughing, and noticed the record in her hands.

“Hey, where did that come from?” 

She pointed to the table.

“Ooh, BJ must have hidden it there so Charles wouldn’t use it to clean the bedpans.” He smiled at her. “May I have this dance?”

Carol handed him the record with a wink. “Okay, but I’m leading.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finally, we begin to see the storylines intertwine! bj's jealous streak is really going to come out to play in the chapters following this, and i swear the hawkbeej content picks up in the next chapters as well. as for miss carol, well, i have some plans for her that i'm very excited about, but pretty soon this isn't just going to be her story, it's going to be everyone's.
> 
> link to song that titled the chapter: https://open.spotify.com/track/69QMV6O5qiuIhPHulLvC86?si=vCLRl2reRZCS4Xc-bwqQCw
> 
> thank you to everyone who comments or leaves kudos, it's always appreciated!
> 
> much love and come chat with me over on tumblr @giaucherie!


	4. dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> finally, we're getting into the trauma! a little slow dancing, a little domestic dinner, and one very revealing dream. tw for blood near the end of the chapter, i tried to make it as tame as possible, but there's still a fair amount of description.

A stillness swept through the air in BJ’s station wagon, leaving only the purring of the engine and Carol’s thoughts for sound. 

_ Somehow, I just knew BJ would drive a station wagon. He’s a family man, you know? That’s what family men do. They compromise for station wagons. Horrible, isn’t it? _

BJ spoke first. “Carol-”

“I hate crying,” she interrupted abruptly.

Just like that day in OR, she could see BJ’s blue eyes warm with affection. “It’s alright to cry, Carol.”

“I only saw you cry a couple of times in two years,” Carol said pointedly, “Unless you were sobbing alone in bed like I was.” She regretted that as soon she saw BJ 's hands tighten on the wheel.

“Yeah, well, it’s a bad habit of mine,” he said tightly. “Holding in my emotions and all that.”

The minutes that followed prickled with hostility, and Carol desperately wanted to scratch the itch of harm off of her skin.

“BJ,” she tried softly, after a charged silence, “I don’t know what I’m saying. I- I- I haven’t had a drink in almost fourteen hours and for a record-breaking alcoholic like me, that’s- that’s- enough to make me forget other people have emotions too.”

BJ didn’t look at her, he just kept driving along the empty road, staring out the windshield.

“I joined AA,” he said.

“You did?”

“It worked.”

“Really?”

“No. Something they don’t teach in AA is how to keep war flashbacks away.” 

“That’s something only Sidney Freedman could teach but he’s probably busy trying to keep them away himself.”

BJ looked in her direction, and Carol was sober enough to see an expression of strange sadness on his face. “You’re a lot more cynical than you used to be.”

Carol looked away from him, through the window. “I know.”

The car crunched on the gravel as BJ pulled into the driveway of the biggest house Carol had ever seen in the suburbs. Her jaw must have dropped because BJ smiled knowingly at her. “Old money,” he explained. “Remind you of anyone particularly snobbish we met once upon a dream?”

As Carol got out of the car, she wished she were wearing something more dressy, that her hair was set, and that maybe if she prayed hard enough she’d be transferred into Marilyn Monroe’s body right at this moment. 

To be fair, BJ was wearing a faded old Henley covered in grease stains, and she couldn’t have looked rattier than he did, but Carol never really felt like she fit in anywhere these days. Not that it kept her awake at night, or anything. 

As they crunched up the long walkway to the front door, Carol reached for BJ’s hand and gave it a squeeze. 

“I’m sorry.” 

They had ended up in front of a massive oak door, and BJ reached out with his free hand to knock.

“You’re forgiven.” He turned to her, and gave her a quick peck on the cheek, and Carol was overwhelmingly grateful he was still willing to put up with her.

However, just as BJ’s lips were pressed to her cheek, the door swung open revealing a woman who looked like Joan Crawford, Lauren Bacall, and Betty Grable all rolled into one. She arched a perfectly manicured eyebrow as Carol pulled back in haste. 

“Well, BJ, no need to look like a kid whose hand got caught in the cookie jar,” she tinkled out in a melodious voice that made Carol hate her immediately. “I won’t tell Peggy.”

BJ flushed a bright red. “Mary, this is my very dear  _ friend _ Carol. We served together in Korea.”

Mary’s sharp blue eyes swept over Carol’s scarf-bound hair, the gingham pants just a little out of season, the sweater that screamed to be thrown out. 

“I didn’t know they were drafting women,” she giggled. “What a shame for the war effort.”

BJ’s grip tightened on Carol’s hand, and she hadn’t even realized they were still holding hands until this moment. “Carol was a volunteer,” he smiled through gritted teeth.

“Oh, did you darn the socks of the soldiers? Or exchange other… services?”

Carol wanted to sob, scream and sock this woman in the face all at once. This felt like that awful exchange she’d had with Hawkeye in the scrub room except she wasn’t going to end up with her tongue halfway down this woman’s throat, and this woman didn’t look like she’d been sorry a day in her life. 

Amazingly, she didn’t burst into tears or grab Mary by the neck. Instead, she calmly retaliated, “The only sewing I did was on kids who’d just gotten shot to pieces by chunks of hot lead. The only services I exchanged were purely medicinal. I hope you weren’t implying that a U.S. Army surgeon would do anything other than their job?”

Mary looked into Carol’s eyes, and Carol closed off her rampaging emotions, looking cooly back at her. BJ’s hand was still tight around hers, and she felt him shift his grip to give her a squeeze. Finally, Mary spoke, flicking her eyelashes haughtily. 

“I’ll get Erin.”

As she stalked away, BJ tugged at her sleeve. “C’mon, let’s go back to the car.”

“Maybe her stilettos will sink into the lawn on the way down,” Carol quipped, prompting fresh howls from BJ 

Ten minutes later, Mary was sweeping down the path with two young girls. One was the spitting image of Shirley Temple, down to the ruffled dress, and one had a wide smile that matched her dad’s down to a tee. “Bye Lanie!” she exclaimed cheerfully. “Bye Miss Mary!”

“Bye Miss Mary,” Carol smirked as she got into the passenger’s seat, and she could almost hear Hawkeye honking with laughter, full of pride for how she’d turned out. 

_ Why am I thinking about Hawkeye  _ now _? Live in the moment, or whatever garbage they teach you in AA. _

As BJ strapped Erin into the carseat, she began babbling on and on about the game of princesses she and Lanie played, and the pictures they drew, and how  _ nice _ Miss Mary was. BJ glanced halfway at Carol, making a face, and she had to stifle her laughter again. He jumped into the front seat as Erin talked to herself and leaned over towards Carol.

“Hey, I’m sorry for what Mary said,” he whispered, glancing back towards Erin. “She was born without a nice bone in her body, but little Lanie is one of Erin’s closest friends, so I put up with her.”

“It’s fine, you can only hurt a veteran so much,” she quipped, noticing BJ’s eyes flash with warning, but continuing right on. “If she’d taken away my alcoholic tendencies, well,  _ then _ we’d have a problem.”

BJ chuckled, but she could tell his heart wasn’t really in it. As he pulled out of the driveway, Carol’s brain screamed,  _ Jokes only hide so much, you idiot!  _

Thankfully, Erin piped up right at that moment and broke Carol out of her would-be spiral.

“Daddy, who’s that lady?” she asked in a sugar sweet tone as lilting as her father’s. 

“Erin, this is Daddy’s friend from when he went away, remember? You can call her Aunt Carol.”

Carol looked over at BJ, mouthing  _ Aunt Carol? _ He winked in response, and Carol hissed “Devil,” which only made his eyes twinkle more.

“Oh!” Erin chirped, “I have an Aunt Carol  _ and _ an Aunt Hawky!”

“Did she say Aunt  _ Hawkeye _ ?” 

BJ’s cheeks flushed red and he looked out the window, pretending to check for incoming traffic. “Oh, you know, kids pick up things they hear around the house.”

“Yeah, I’m sure. That’s why my sister’s kids call me ‘unmarried’ and ‘missing a few crackers,’” Carol returned with a hard stare. “Don’t lie to me, BJ.”

BJ gazed out the windshield as they sped along the empty road. “I’m not lying, Carol,” he said, like a liar. “I just don’t think Erin grasps the difference between aunts, uncles, and friends yet.”

Carol noticed his hands were clamped tight around the steering wheel again, so she decided not to press the issue. Not right now, at least. 

The rest of the car ride was filled with light conversation and jokes, mostly for Erin’s sake, who was explaining, in great detail, the plights and perils of all her dolls. As they pulled into the garage, Carol was just learning about how Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy were in a fight because Ann took the last of Andy’s cookies. She got out of the car, and Erin ran up next to her, still explaining the punishment Ann was going to get for theft. 

“It’s wrong to steal,” Erin said very solemnly, clinging to Carol’s hand, and she laughed. 

“Your daddy really set you straight,” she smiled, glancing at BJ who was unlocking the door. “He needed to make up for himself.” Erin didn’t hear this last part because Carol had hissed it in BJ’s ear before swooping into the house. 

As soon as she walked in, a savory scent enveloped her, and couldn’t help but linger in the warm aroma as Peg hurried out of what must have been the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron. 

“Carol!” she cried, “Just in time for dinner! I was worried BJ wouldn’t bring you back.”

Carol laughed, “He can’t get rid of me that easily. Can I help? I’m a lousy cleaner but a pretty good cook.”

“You  _ could _ help me with the salad, but I won’t force you. You  _ are _ a very special guest, you know.”

“More like a very  _ obnoxious _ guest,” a voice hissed in her ear and Carol knew this was going to be retaliation for earlier. She nodded at Peg and followed her across the room, feeling BJ’s eyes burning through her back. 

Peg disappeared into the kitchen, so Carol quietly, daringly, called behind her, “If your eyes burn my bra, you’re going to buy me a new one,  _ and _ you’ll be the one picking it out at Bergdorf Goodman’s.” 

She glanced back at him, hoping for a red face or a bashful grin, but BJ just smirked right back at her. 

“I know you don’t shop at Bergdorf Goodman’s,” he crooned, “It shows on your out-of-season behind.” 

_ Lech _ . _ He’s spent too long with Hawkeye. _

As the kitchen door swung shut, she shot a glare at BJ that told him she wasn’t done with him, and he sent one back telling her she wasn’t off her miserable hook either. 

Inside the warm, rusty-walled kitchen, Peg handed Carol a head of lettuce, and Carol walked to the sink, separating the leaves into a colander. 

“You know,” Peg said, “You’re a very pretty woman, Carol. Is everyone in the army as lovely as you?”

“Well, they say in the army the men are just as pretty as the women.” 

“So I’ve heard,” Peg mused, and Carol felt dangerously close to a hidden truth, the same way she had in the car. Then, the mood shifted so abruptly Carol almost got whiplash. “Corporal Klinger was the one in the dress, right?” 

“Klinger has better fashion sense than me!” Carol laughed, “He gave me a couple of his dresses before the war ended and they’re still more fashionable three years later than anything I’ve bought recently.”

“I think you look very Parisian, the way you’re dressed,” Peg smiled, “It fits your modesty.”

Carol chopped lettuce a little more aggressively then she needed to on that note.  _ Remember when there was a time when you’d stare in the mirror for hours getting ready? Now, every mirror just shows a new person I don’t want to be. A person changed for the worse.  _

“I’m actually quite vain,” were the words that came out of her mouth instead.

Peg looked right at Carol, like she could see every thought in Carol’s brain. “No you’re not,” she said knowingly. “You look like you haven’t had a proper meal since the war and you showed up with eye bags the size of dinner plates. A vain person wouldn’t take such bad care of themselves.”

Carol gaped at her, and Peg quickly tacked on, “Forgive me if I’m too forward.”

“No- no, it’s ok, uh, BJ said the same thing.” 

They chopped in mutual silence for a couple more minutes. Carol scooped finely shredded lettuce into a large bowl and added oil and vinegar, plus a healthy dash of salt and pepper. 

Peg picked up the bowl, preparing to bring it into the dining room. She glanced back at Carol, eyes softening. “My husband tortures himself daily, and I know you do the same just by skipping your meals or calling in sick from work. You don’t deserve to do that to yourself.”

Carol looked down at her low pumps, studying her warped, shiny, red reflection.

“I hope you’ll stay for a while,” the other woman said quietly, “Our guest bedroom is always open for customers.”

Carol’s voice was barely a whisper as she responded. “I think I will.”

Dinner was one of the homiest, nicest meals Carol had had in years. Peg had cooked a hearty beef stew that BJ quipped was only good because all Irish people were born with the

recipe engraved in their memory. Peg had replied “ _ half _ Irish,” and then threatened to send BJ outside without a key until he could figure out how to behave himself in front of company. 

Erin clutched at Carol’s sleeve and taught her about the animals she had learned about in school, and Carol laughed with Peg as BJ tried to defend himself from the barrage of witty retorts the two women were swapping about him. BJ flung a piece of bread at Carol’s head after Carol had cheekily called him the “Campbell Soup Freud,” retaliating that he knew the perfect way to fix  _ her _ head. This caused Erin to end up in hysterics and lift up her own piece of bread, which was quickly plucked out of her small hand by a glaring Peg, who banished the two of them into the living room until they could “act like adults.”

Peg put Erin to bed, and turned in herself, as BJ and Carol polished off half a bottle of scotch and clutched at each other, cackling like teenagers swapping gossip. The whole evening was tinted bourbon by the time she had finished her last scotch on the rocks, but it was a warm, beautiful, rich amber color rather than the cold stone brown of drinking alone in her kitchen.  _ Being an alcoholic is so much more fun when you have friends. _

“I’ll drink to that!” BJ slurred, and Carol was only slightly shocked at having said her thought out loud. Somehow, they ended up standing, swaying ever so slightly, feeling that the  _ responsible _ thing to do would be to go to bed. BJ showed her to her bedroom, only mistaking it for one closet on the way, and Carol threw her arms limply around him in a hug. 

“Thank you, BJ,” she glowed, drunk on love and appreciation and a  _ lot _ of scotch. He lazily replied, “Any time,” with a kiss that ended up more on her nose than her cheek. Carol lay back on the soft cotton bedspread of an unfamiliar room, and felt the haze of scotch deepen into a shroud, until the shroud became heavy wool, her vision dimmed, and the world went black as she passed out into a deep sleep. 

\-----------------

The Swamp’s canvas was down, and the dim flicker of army-issue lamps shouldn’t have been as cozy as it felt, especially since Carol knew full well the peace she was feeling couldn’t last. Hawkeye carefully placed the needle onto the record, grinning as he removed one of Charles’s, casually tossing it onto the cot without its sleeve. He took her hand in his, and smiled that soft, crinkly-eyed smile. 

“I just want you to know one thing,” he murmured.

“What?”

“I’m a rotten dancer.”

Carol swatted his arm, but there was no anger in the gesture. “Well for one night, and one night only, all of Korea gets to experience the dancing duo of Pierce and Campbell.”

“I hope the whole country is covering its eyes.”

_ You must remember this, a kiss is still a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh, the fundamental things apply… as time goes by.... _

Carol felt Hawkeye’s arm tighten around her waist, and she moved in a little closer. Their dance was little more than sidestepping, but to her, it was like every MGM musical number had been transferred into their two pairs of army-issue combat boots. 

“You were being modest when you said you were rotten. I don’t think Gene Kelly could do any better,” she murmured, looking up into warm eyes and feeling a rush of giddiness.

“Well,” Hawkeye rolled his eyes up and grinned, “I didn’t want to admit I taught him everything he knows.”

“Certainly old enough to have,” Carol teased as they rounded the stove.

“Oh, that’s bad of you,” he scoffed, in mock indignation, but pulling her into a twirl that rivaled anything displayed in the Ziegfeld Follies. 

The light mood, the contentment, the joy of swapping jokes washed over Carol like a fresh ray of sunshine, and she felt herself break into a real grin for the first time in days. Weeks. Months.

She braved another look up at Hawkeye, and against her better judgement, brushed an infuriatingly loose dark lock of hair out of his eyes. 

“You’re beautiful when you’re happy, you know that?” 

_ Was he- he wasn’t- being sincere? He couldn’t be. _

She waited for the punchline, but when none came, she let out a breath she hadn’t even known she was holding.

“I could say the same for you,” she said quietly.

The stillness of the air was stifling and it felt like they were the only two people in the world. She could have drunk the sweetness through a straw. But something didn’t feel quite right.

Then, a boom echoed through the haze of joy and softness. And another. The tent shook, and she realized what she was hearing. They were being shelled.

Hawkeye tightened his grip on Carol’s waist as the booms echoed through the compound. She knew he was trying to pass it off as a change in step, but she felt how his pulse spiked, and saw a flash of fear dash across his face. Just like that, she was yanked right back into reality. She could feel her own pulse picking up as he whirled her around the corner again, the booms getting louder and the ground beginning to shake even harder. 

_ It's still the same old story, A fight for love and glory, A case of do or die… _

Of course it was the same old story. You either did your soldierly duty or you died, plain and simple. It was a fight for glory for some, a fight for love back home for others. For Carol, it was a fight against nothing. Nothing could ever be beautiful here, nothing could ever be normal, nothing would ever be like it was again. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Just blood, and fear, and war, and death, and guilt and- her grip tightened on Hawkeye’s hand until her knuckles were white, her waist was pulled flush against Hawkeye’s hips, and they landed splayed across the dingy blanket on his cot, and-

_ The world will always welcome lovers, As time goes by… _

What a welcome from the world. Her mouth was on his, and his hands were clasping hers, her hands were in his hair, and the feeling of survival once again washed over her. She felt him kiss her neck, pulling aside the collar of her fatigues, skimming her collarbone.  _ God, I want you to bite those captain’s bars right off my shoulders _ . 

_ What? Who was that? Get out of my goddamn head. _

The shells echoed in her ears and he pressed into her harder and harder, his hands going to her lower back, her hands tilting his jawline towards her lips, the feeling of her teeth grazing across stubble bringing with it an instinct to stay like this for the rest of her life, because this was her life support now. 

She felt an odd sort of lack, like she was waiting for her hands to reach towards his belt, or waiting for him to scramble at the buttons on her shirt, but it never came. They just lay together, making out like two teenagers who borrowed the Buick for the first time. It wasn’t romantic and it didn’t inspire Carol with any wild passion for him, but it was  _ now  _ and it was a welcome relief. Well, and it certainly fulfilled some of her instincts that had been going nuts ever since she got to this dirt pit. 

Then, a silence rushed across the compound after what seemed like an eternity of noise. She pulled back, noting how Hawkeye’s face was shiny with sweat, damp hair once again falling into his eyes, and looking equally as exhausted as she felt. They didn’t even have to speak, he just pulled her back into his arms, and she shut her eyes, hoping for once in her life she would dream about nothing.

\-----------------

_ The sun was rising and all Carol could feel were strong arms and a warm chest behind her head. She shifted around and looked into eyes blinking blearily open.  _

_ “G’morning Carrie-” Peter rasped out sleepily, and it was as if a gate opened in Carol’s chest, letting in all the warmth, sunshine and happiness in the world. She felt like a radiant cliche. Carol reached up and brushed her lips lightly across his and adjusted herself so her head fit right in the crook of his neck. _

_ Peter looked down at her with those big green eyes she wanted to study for hours, days, weeks, years. “I love you, you know that?” he said softly. His face split into a gentle smile as he ran his fingers tenderly through her auburn locks.  _

_ Carol smiled back and opened her mouth to respond, but in that split second, Peter was gone. All that was left was a slight indent in the mattress. She sat up, confused, and noticed a different sensation to the room that had seemed so full of love and beauty just seconds before. She hesitantly looked down at her hands. _

_ They were gloved, covered in blood, a scalpel staining the floral print of the bedspread beneath her hands.  _

_ “No,” she wheezed out. “NO!” The scream echoed off walls and disappeared into the ether. _

_ “Carrie,” a hoarse voice croaked, “Carrie, save me.” _

_ Carol didn’t want to look down, but some invisible force dragged her sight into her lap. Peter lay beneath the flowered sheet on an operating table, bleeding, sweating, crying. _

_ “Carrie, Carrie, Carrie…” he choked out, blood spilling from his mouth. More blood poured onto Carol’s slippers. Why was she wearing slippers in the OR? They weren’t sterile. She watched numbly as the pale pink wool was splashed with the awful dark crimson of a dying man. _

_ “CARRIE!” he wailed. “PLEASE CARRIE, DO SOMETHING!”  _

_ His guttural cry broke Carol down to her core. “I can’t,” she sobbed desperately, cutting wildly, her scalpel leaving blooms of red on her pink silk robe, “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.” _

_ A boom echoed through the OR. Then another, and another, and another until the power turned out, plunging Carol and the OR into pitch darkness. _

_ “Carrie…” Peter’s voice was barely louder than a crinkle of tissue paper. “Carrie...I- I- lo- lo- love you, y- you know th- that…”  _

_ Carol felt sick to her stomach for the first time in OR and without warning, she pivoted around from her table and threw up. Silence echoed through the room as she coughed and shivered and sobbed, clutching her bloodstained robe around her shoulders. “Peter?” she asked weakly. “Peter? Peter?” There was no reply. She felt herself grow frantic. “Peter, speak to me, Peter, are you alright?”  _

_ Then screams, screams that came from a part of her she didn’t know existed. “PETER! PLEASE, PETER, YOU CAN’T GIVE UP! NOT NOW!” she heaved, feeling tears spill out of her eyes, taking breaths that shook her to her core. She was desperate. “Peter. Peter! PETER!” She swung her fist into the dark, hoping to connect with a chest or a throat but it was suspended by some invisible force, transparent, delicate surgeon’s fingers keeping her at bay. _

_ A cold, impersonal, unfamiliar voice echoed through her mind. “It’s over. Just… move on.” _

_ “NO!” she sobbed, melting into the ground, feeling the scalpel fall from her numbed fingers. Then a shell echoed, and another, and another until one exploded over her head and Carol’s whole world went pure white.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all for being so patient, i recognize it's almost been a month since i updated, but life has been kicking my ass recently and i haven't been able to write on a regular schedule. the story is far from over, though! i have four more chapters waiting to be edited, and a couple more in the works. it's killing me not being able to release all the details at once, but i guess that's what a slow-ish burn is supposed to do.  
> anyways...i'm not saying we finally get some bj repression hours in the next chapter...but that's exactly what we get...ft his trapper complex...
> 
> link to song that titled the chapter: https://open.spotify.com/track/0AtVA7axXKVFnjQsN4xBIy?si=DfTwI4YKSWWJVrAkn5ANBg
> 
> as always, comments and kudos are appreciated, and thanks for sticking with me! <3
> 
> love always, and come chat with me over on tumblr @giaucherie!

**Author's Note:**

> this has been my sole focus for around two months, and it's not even finished. buckle up for a long, winding ride because there are eight chapters just waiting to be edited and reviewed in my google docs, and a whole lot of pain (and fun) contained in them.
> 
> on the other hand, this is my first fanfic ever, and it wasn't even intended to spiral so deep into a crazy complicated storyline like it has. i've been incredibly nervous to post this because of perfectionism and the fact that i feel like an amateur, but sometimes you just gotta send your work into the world, whether you're ready or not!!
> 
> these damn doctors have set up camp in my brain for over half a year and i'll never be the same again, but honestly, is that such a bad thing?
> 
> comments and feedback would be greatly appreciated!!


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